The present invention relates to a system and a method for fitting articles of clothing to an image of a user over the Internet, and more particularly, to an automatic system and a method for fitting articles of clothing on a real image of the user.
Electronic commerce through the Internet is increasing exponentially. Computer users are able to purchase goods and services through the Internet, often placing such purchases through the Web site of a vendor. One difficulty inherent with clothing purchases over the Internet is the inability to try the clothing on before it is purchased. A user would obviously prefer to be able to try on the article of clothing before purchase, to examine the fit and size of the article of clothing on the body of the individual user.
A number of solutions have been proposed to overcome this drawback for purchasing clothing through the Internet. For example, a software package from ModaCAD.TM. is only able to show clothing on a stylized mannequin and not on an image of the user.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,680,528 discloses a software program which fits a set of dimensions of the user into one of a predetermined set of models of the human body. The particular characteristics which make each individual unique are lost in this transition. For example, if a user had a slightly crooked back, this back would be straightened to the "normative" model. The disclosed program also moves the body of the user to fit the clothing model. For example, if the hands of the user are not in the appropriate position for the modeled clothes, then the software moves the hands accordingly. Furthermore, the software requires manual intervention to obtain a good fit of the dimensions of the body of the user to the model. Thus, the software disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,680,528 clearly has many drawbacks.
Therefore, there is an unmet need for, and it would be highly useful to have, a method and a system which displays an image of an article of clothing as it would appear on the body of the user, according to the dimension of the body of the user, without requiring the dimensions of the user to be altered to fit a pre-existing model.